


Quiet Night

by engmaresh



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Fluff Bingo Quarter 2, Foot Massage, Friendship/Love, Intimacy, Rare Pairings, quiet moments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-20
Updated: 2019-05-20
Packaged: 2020-03-08 20:11:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18901807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/engmaresh/pseuds/engmaresh
Summary: Zhu Li can't sleep. And Kuvira won't sleep. Together they make quite a pair.





	Quiet Night

**Author's Note:**

> Written to fulfill the fluff bingo square for [affection].

There was still a light on in Kuvira’s office, the dim orange glow shining through the portal window of the door like a miniature sun in the dark corridor of the train. Zhu Li knocked once, soft enough to warn, not startle, and without waiting for a response, opened the door.

“Zhu Li.” The voice came from the direction of the couch, not the desk. Dressed in her sleep clothes but still very much awake, Kuvira sat stretched out across the couch, papers in her lap and spilling across the surface of the coffee table. The warm light of the reading lamp cast half of her face in shadow, but even that could not disguise the dark bags under her eyes. “What are you still doing up?”

Slipping into the room, Zhu Li quietly slid the door shut behind her. “I could ask the same of you. It’s past three in the morning.”

“Oh,” said Kuvira. She looked genuinely surprised, her eyes flickered over to the heavy clock on her desk. “I hadn’t noticed.”

“No surprise there,” said Zhu Li dryly. She padded over to the couch, and lifted Kuvira’s feet into her lap so that she could sit down at the other end. “Please, go to bed.”

Kuvira shook her head, hair tumbling into her face. She usually braided it for bed but tonight it hung half loose, like she’d run her hands through it several times. “I can’t.” She lifted the heavy stack of papers from her lap. “I still have to finish reading Guan’s proposal for the—”

Zhu Li pursed her lips as she looked at the document and the many others scattered across the table. She’d read some of Guan’s reports: he often said very little with far too many words, and thought himself very clever and sneaky for it. “I’m sure that can wait.”

For better encouragement, she started rolling up the legs of Kuvira’s loose trousers, running her hands over the lightly stubbled skin of her calves. Kuvira’s eyes fluttered shut, and she sighed.

“Oh, Zhu Li. Whatever would I do without you?”

Zhu Li huffed a laugh. “I’m sure you’d survive admirably.” Taking one of Kuvira’s feet in her hands, she pressed her thumb into the arch. “Except for a lack of sleep, but I can see my presence has hardly changed that anyway.”

“Mmmm.” Kuvira’s toes twitched at another firm press of Zhu Li’s fingers, and she slid a little lower into the couch, but when Zhu Li looked up from her massage, her eyes were open again, and fixed determinedly on Guan’s useless novel of a report.

“You’re really going to finish this, aren’t you?” Zhu Li punctuated the question with a hard twist of her knuckle against the joint of Kuvira’s big toe.

Kuvira grunted and cracked her neck. “Just ten more pages.”

“That looks like more than ten pages to me,” Zhu Li observed. She repeated the move with Kuvira’s other foot. Kuvira jerked, and Zhu Li heard her crack her neck again. A poke to her thigh with Kuvira’s big toe made her look up.

Sharp green eyes narrowed, Kuvira looked at her suspiciously over the top of her report. “What are you–unnh—” That was Zhu Li again, digging her knuckles into her calloused heel. “What are you doing?”

“Reflexology,” said Zhu Li simply, though she knew the short answer would annoy Kuvira. “It should help you unwind.”

Groaning, Kuvira let her head fall back against the armrest of the couch. But she didn’t move her feet from Zhu Li’s lap. “Why don’t you just go back to bed? You’re not any less busy then I am.”

“Can’t sleep,” said Zhu Li, and she left it at that. Kuvira didn’t press, already aware of Zhu Li’s odd, erratic sleep schedule. When she lifted her hands briefly to adjust the glasses sliding down her nose, she heard Kuvira whine softly and press her feet deeper into her lap. Zhu Li looked at her over her glasses and caught out in a moment of weakness, the younger woman blushed.

“You have magic hands,” she muttered, before lifting up the report in a poor attempt to cover up her embarrassment.

Zhu Li laughed softly. “Just a lot of practice.” She moved her hands up Kuvira’s calves, focusing on the shift of skin over hard muscle, tight under her hands from extended periods of sitting and standing. And slowly, as Kuvira loosed up under her firm ministrations, Zhu Li found herself unwinding too. The low light, the repetitive motions of her hands, and Kuvira’s warmth and her soft, rhythmic breathing; they all started making her think of her cabin again, and its comfortable bunk. How much easier sleep would come with someone tucked close behind her.

She was startled back into awareness at the sound of papers sliding from Kuvira’s lap, their hard edges clacking as they hit the floor. Zhu Li straightened, realising she’d nodded off, and when she turned to Kuvira, found that the same held true for her. But she hadn’t woken at the sound, and slept on, her face turned towards the couch and softened in sleep. A stray strand of hair had fallen across her face, and fluttered with every gentle breath.

Her chest suddenly feeling tight, Zhu Li carefully lifted Kuvira’s legs from her lap, slipping out from under them so that she could get to her feet. The younger woman stirred at the motion, curling deeper into herself, but she did not wake. Quietly Zhu Li retrieved a pillow and a blanket, kept for this very purpose in the bottom drawer of one of Kuvira’s filing cabinets. She managed to slip the pillow under Kuvira’s head with little fuss, and tucked the blanket around her. Knowing Kuvira, it would probably be kicked off within the hour, but the night was warm and so Zhu Li wasn’t going to worry about that.

Tamping down on the small undercurrent of disappointment that she was returning to her cabin alone, Zhu Li knelt down by Kuvira’s head, and tucked the stray strand of hair behind her ear. “Good night,” she murmured, pressing a quick kiss to Kuvira’s brow. Then she turned off the light and as quietly as she came, slipped back off to bed.


End file.
